Birbhum violence: Eyewitness claims fire brigade personnel waited for 10 hours to recover bodies

The fire brigade personnel waited for 10 hours to enter the burned houses in Birbhum to recover charred bodies due to intense heat said an eyewitness of the Birbhum violence in West BengalDue to immense heat it was not possible to get into those burnt houses at that time but the search operation for injured and affected persons continued till 7 am the next morning as per the complainantOn Friday the Central Bureau of Investigation CBI took over the probe into the Birbhum violence case following a Calcutta High Court orderThe complainant is a subinspector posted in Ramphurat police station in Birbhum and also the first responder to the incidentThe FIR copy reads that at around 935 pm on March 21 he received information from subinspector Ramesh Saha of Rampurhat police station duty officer that some houses of Bogtui village have caught fire and are burningI along with my accompanying officers and force rushed to Bogtui village to work out the information At about 1005 pm we reached Bogtui village which is located at a distance of about one km from Bogtui Morh on NH60 to work out the information and found that eight houses and some straw heaps and caught devastative fire and were burning fiercely he mentioned in the FIRI immediately called duty officer SI Ramesh Saha and asked him to promptly inform fire brigade personnel to rush to the spot to extinguish the fire After that myself along with my son tried my level best to douse the fire with the help of local people by pouring water by buckets but failed to do so as the fire was so devastative At about 1025 pm the fire brigade personnel of Rampurhat Fire and Emergency Services arrived at the spot with two fire tenders and started fire fighting operations he saidDuring fire fighting operations four persons were found having burn injuries They were immediately shifted to Rampurhat Medical College and Hospital with the help of local people and their relatives The fire was anyhow brought under control and at about 2 am the fire brigade personnel left the spot after the fire was more or less doused FIR readsDue to immense heat it was not possible to get into those burnt houses at that time However search process for injured and affected persons was continued on March 22 next day morning at about 0710 am the fire brigade personnel again arrived at the village and joined in our search operations as per complainant statement in the FIRThe FIR further reads that most of the houses were completely gutted and also were found to have been ransacked While the search operation was in progress seven burnt dead bodies were recovered from the houses One injured person rescued from the house succumbed to her serious burn injuries during treatment at a hospitalAll the bodies were charred to death beyond recognition The dead bodies were immediately shifted to Rampurhat College and Hospital for holding postmortem examination he said in the FIRA total of eight people were burnt to death in the Rampurhat area of West Bengals Birbhum on Tuesday after a mob allegedly set houses on fire following the killing of Trinamool Congress TMC leader Bhadu SheikhThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever